The Chinese language is defined on the basis of Chinese characters, which stabilize monosyllabic root morphemes across the countless varieties. As subsyllabic linguistic forms such as derivational morphology can hardly be represented by Chinese characters, compounding is preferred over derivation in Chinese. Compounds do not have fixed word boundaries. The wordhood of compounds pertains to the level of conventionality in language use, which is a continuum instantiated by synchronic gradience and diachronic gradualness. A perennial archaizing aesthetics further complicates the determination of Chinese words by preserving classical linguistic forms in formal and literary writing, thus making every synchronic stratum heterogeneous by blurring the distinction between historical strata. Therefore, the boundaries of words have always been fluid in native speakers’ mental lexicon.

中文翻译：

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什么是中文单词？汉语词汇构式

汉语是在汉字的基础上定义的，汉字稳定了无数变体的单音节词根语素。由于派生词等亚音节语言形式很难用汉字来表示，因此汉语中复合优于派生。复合词没有固定的词界。复合词的词性属于语言使用的常规水平，是由共时渐变和历时渐变所体现的连续体。长期的仿古美学通过在正式和文学写作中保留古典语言形式，使中文词语的确定进一步复杂化，从而模糊了历史阶层之间的区别，从而使每个共时阶层变得异质。因此，单词的界限在母语人士的心理词典中一直是不稳定的。